If I Were You

''If I Were You'' is a comic novel by P. G. Wodehouse first published in 1931, often described as a story of "hair restoration and heir restoration" because it revolves around a baby-switching secret involving an English Earl and a cockney barber.

The story follows Anthony ("Tony"), fifth Earl of Droitwich, who is comfortably engaged to the wealthy Violet Waddington. His life is thrown into chaos when his old nurse, Ma Price, reveals a long-kept secret: she switched her own son with the Earl's son when they were infants.

According to her story, the "real" Earl is actually her son, Syd Price, a socialist barber from London. To test the claim and settle their own romantic interests, Tony and Syd swap lives. Tony heads to London to run a barber shop—accompanied by the charming American manicurist Polly Brown—while the uncouth Syd attempts to navigate the rigours of high society at the family estate, Langley End.